Debian Repository Builder

A simple utility for constructing and maintaining Debian repositories. Configuration of a repo is based on the directory hierarchy, and a TOML configuration file. Real world repos to demonstrate may be found bellow.

• System76 CUDA Repo
• Pop!_OS Proprietary Repo

Key Features

• Can import pre-built Debian archives from external sources
• Can repackage pre-built Debian archives
• Can build packages from various sources, using sbuild
• Supports multiple components within a suite
• Supports migrating packages between components
• Processes Debian archives within the pool in parallel.
• Generates distribution file archives in parallel
• Generates Packages, Sources, Contents, and Release dist files.
• Repos will be apt-file-compatible

Todo

• Generate Appstream + Icon archives

Directory Structure

The root directory of a debrep-based repo will contain the following directories:

• assets/: where files that need to be linked at build-time are stored
  • cache/: files which debrep downloads from external sources, and should be cached between runs
  • share/: files that can be shared across packages, and are specified in the TOML config
  • packages/: files which are automatically linked to the build before building
  • replace/${suite}/${component}/${arch}/package/files/: Repackage prepackaged archives
    • DEBIAN: control archive files to replace
    • data: data archive files to replace
• build/${suite}/: debrep performs all builds within this directory.
  • Every file is linked / sourced here at build time.
  • After each successful build, files are moved into the repo.
• debian/${suite}/: contains the debian configuration for each source package that needs one.
  • The directories within must have the same name as the source package they reference.
  • Each package directory contains the entire contents of the debian directory for that package.
• metapackages/${suite/: place your metapackage.cfg equivs files in here.
  • On build, they'll be generated and placed into the repo.
• record/${suite}/: keeps tabs on what source packages have been built
• repo/: Contains the archive & associated dist and pool directories for each
• suites/${suite}.toml: Configuration files for each repo to build.

Highly Parallel Distribution File Generation

Since this tool is written in Rust, one of the key focuses has been on making it do as much as it can in parallel, as fast as it can do it. It uses thread pools, parallel iterators, and state machines to achieve that goal. Each component of a suit; each architecture in those components; and each package in those architectures are all processed in parallel. Data from each archive is also processed in parallel, and the final stage of processing that data into information and writing it to various compressed archives is done in parallel as well. Our tool should be fast with large archives.

Source Building Support

Packages can be generated from sources so long as you provide the debian files necessary -- either by using existing debian files in the upstream archive or git repository, or by providing your own through a variety of means.

Components Support

Managing components are supported by this utility! There's currently a default_component variable for the config, which will designate where packages will be stored by default. The migrate subcommand can be used to move packages between components. After moving packages, the dist files will be re-generated.

Contents Generation

Tools like apt-file require the the repository stores Contents archives, which it will download and read from to find which packages contain what files in a repository. This tool will process and generate these files in parallel as it is also processing the Packages archives.

Repo Structure

This is what you can expect to see after a successful build. You may sync the dists and pool directories to your package server to make your repository accessible to other machines.

repo/
  dists/
    cosmic/
    bionic/
      Contents-amd64
      Contents-amd64.gz
      Contents-amd64.xz
      InRelease
      proposed/
        binary-amd64/
          Packages
          Packages.gz
          Packages.xz
          Release
      main/
        binary-amd64/
          Packages
          Packages.gz
          Packages.xz
          Release
        source/
          Sources
          Sources.gz
          Sources.xz
        Release
        Release.gpg
  pool/
    cosmic/
    bionic/
      proposed/
        binary-amd64/
          p/
            package/
              package...
      main/
        binary-amd64/
          p/
            package/
              package_version_amd64.buildinfo
              package_version_amd64.changes
              package_version_amd64.deb
              package-dbgsym_version_amd64.ddeb
        source/
          p/
            package/
              package_version.dsc
              package_version.tar.xz

Usage

Create / update a Debian repository

debrep build [ -f | --force ]
debrep build packages <PACKAGES>... [ -f | --force ]
debrep build pool
debrep build dist

Migrate packages between components

debrep migrate package1 package2 pacakge3 --from proposed --to main

Clean up old packages

debrep clean

Remove packages

debrep remove <PACKAGES>...